I love this documentary of writer Raina Lee, who inherited her parents' house of hoarding horrors. This reminds me of my pack rat family. My parents and grandparents collect everything, and can't handle throwing anything out, including used jars (you never know when you might need to can something,) old stuffed animals (for their undeniable cuteness,) test scores from the 6th grade (I might never get an A++ ever again,) and makeup that expired long, long, long ago (it's still good!).

The boy and I have grown up with this same mentality, and as we're in the process of purging our apartment (I found my diploma people!) I thought sharing Raina's plight was a timely blog post. I also found some old photos that I was supposed to scan and upload long ago, and finally managed to today. This is one of my favorites.

[My mother, San Francisco, before Mo]

Follow Raina at her blog, The Infinite Garage, and wish me luck while I take an hour to reminisce over every item in my apartment.

I can't watch the video right now, but I still wanted to leave a comment. My parents are the exact same and I think, I hope... , because of that I'm not, ha! When we moved they had hundreds of boxes and I had my ten... of my entire life (or, well.. that's how I'm looking at it : ) ). Good luck packing away! I hope it doesn't take TOO long to go through all of your things or you won't be done in time!

Thanks for sharing that very cool photo of your mom! Love the Golden Gate Bridge in the back (that is what the bridge is, right?)!

Gosh, my dad is definitely the hoarder in the family and though, we are similar in so many ways, I'm glad I didn't inherit the hoarding gene from him. Good luck with all the packing up and sorting of stuff.